HC: Citycell to continue operation till Sept 16

The country's oldest mobile phone operator Citycell will get time till September 16 to continue its operation. A High Court bench of Justice Syed Refaat Ahmed made the order following regulator's show cause notice that was served on August 17. According to the notice, the regulator asked Citycell to provide a reply within September 16, 2016 why the BTRC will not shut down its operation. On Sunday, the lawyer for Citycell filed an application for injunction under Section 248 of the Companies Act 1994, to restrain Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) from taking steps to cancel its license. The High Court dealt with the application on Monday. Upon hearing on the lawyers for China Development Bank, Citycell and BTRC, the HC gave the order in this connection. “The HC directed BTRC not to cancel the operator license issued to Citycell by BTRC until September 16, 2016 and thereby comply with the show cause notice issued by BTRC to Citycell," said Barrister Sayed Mahsib Hossain, a counsel of BTRC. The HC didn't accept or reject Citycell's application. It ordered to follow BTRC's show cause notice timeline; till then the operator would be able to continue its operation, he added. On July 31, BTRC asked Citycell to pay its all dues, including regulatory fee and fine worth Tk477 crore, by August 16. The telecom regulator also ordered the company to create an alternative arrangement for providing the service to its subscribers even after shutdown. BTRC director (licence) MA Tayab Hossain served a notice to the operator to explain why it should not face legal action for not paying dues. A high level meeting of Telecommunication Division gave Citycell more time to switch over subscriber's RIM that would be ended on 23 August.